Forgive me if any of you are closest Isles fans, but if I were Tavares they would have to give me 8mil + per season to even consider staying in that cancerous organization. I would take a pay cut simply to LEAVE.

a) He’s RFA, so he doesnt have much leverage
b) Who in their right mind turns down $33 million of guaranteed money?
c) If weve learnt anything from dany heatley, all you have to do is publically demand a trade, and you will be traded.

I can’t reveal names of course and it was a long time ago. I was a resident at the Montreal General doing my radiology rotation. A Hab player had a scan, which I was meant to report. While going through his file I found a little note he had written for the MR Technician. the proposal in the note made me realize that whatever was ailing him was not too serious…

Well summer is almost over What a great summer I have 17 stamps on my passport… So what is new on here?? I can take a wild guess and say few on here think the sky is falling again. I think the Habs and going to make a few on here eat a lot of crow. I can’t wait for Oct 6th.

This is the poster that was telling everyone he played hockey with Nathan Beaulieu the week before and was having lunch with Cammalleri the next day etc. He got laughed off the site so not much to watch for…except some giggles

I had to have an MRI today and the technician (female) used to work at a clinic that did “all of the Canadiens”. She said two stood out. Doug Gilmour was the nicest of all the Habs. (She said Koivu was also very nice but more shy.) And the biggest a**h***? Hmmm… can you guess? A hint: he’s someone more recent than Gilmour (and not currently on the team)… and was “very full of himself”.

She said he was totally full of himself, like he thought he was king sh** and every woman wanted him. Her least favorite Hab by far she said.
And BTW, great that she liked Dougie so much. He was an awesome dude. Wish we had another like that.

Im looking at the pics, and our guys look in good shape. All have definition on forearms and quite veiny, so low body fat.

Lars Eller is 200 pounds but looks soooooo skinny, this to me says that he will easily build into a 220-230 frame once he hits maturity. I remember him holding back 4 bruins last playoffs, so imagine when his strength matures.

Cole, AK, Pacman, if these 3 stay healthy we will see a lot of success.

Man, was that JM smiling? Not once, but a couple of times? I wonder what he was on.

Ryan White, with his missing tooth, reminds of Bobby Clarke. Come to think of it, that’s what Ryan is, a throwback.

Eller looked, well, a little out of sorts. Perhaps the shoulder isn’t healing as well as he would have liked?

Gill looked like was ready to tell PK he was a “bleeping” idiot (that quote is from a Basu column last year to show actually how well Gill and PK were getting along); PK looked he was ready to be “mentored” by big Hal again.

Markov looked relaxed. Gorges too.

I agree, what the hell was Spacek doing wearing a turtleneck? Everyone knows Pleks has the copyright on that. I hope Spacek paid him a good royalty.

Pleks looked good, too.

Nice to have some legends there: Lafleur and Henri. Even Carbo made it. Geoff Molson was smiling — isn’t he still on the hook for Carbo’s salary?

What does all this mean? Absolutely zippo. But I don’t think team chemistry can be faked well, and there does seem to be chemistry. And when the owner is all smiles, that must count for something.

I am guessing Ryan White’s favourite player growing up was Ryan Smyth. Talk about your old school mullet along with the missing tooth smile. He sure looks like a happy kid in a candy story. Good for him.

Agreed, although Marchand really is still a notch below some of the other big names without contracts. He turned a great playoff performance into some extra coin.

The Habs will want to keep on eye on the deals that Schenn and Myers get. That will dictate (to a degree) what Subban may nail down (depending on the new CBA, which could totally screw Subban out of some money).

All of these kids are different types of Dmen, and none of them are as good as Doughty. (Of course we’re not sure Doughty is as good as Doughty. But that doesn’t mean much in the NHL) My gut tells that Subban is going to get more than some Hab fans think, especially if he skips the sophomore jinx this year (and my gut tells me he will).

scott gomez looks like the same GOOFY , out of shape, slow centre who refused to play defence, you woud of thought last year would have lit a fire under his ass this offseason, he dosnt look rowled up this off season, i really hope we dump him!

I’m pretty sure that’s not how cap space works. If Markov misses the first 10 games we don’t save any cap space for the future.

It also means that we have 1/8 of our season without one of our star players. That means a lot more of Spacek or Diaz. Could also lead to a shaky start which is a problem seeing that a playoff spot is usually decided by a handful of points.

It depends if they put him on LTIR and it doesn’t go by games played it goes by days on LTIR. And it doesn’t add to our cap space it allows us to exceed the salary cap by the amount we saved on Markov. For example, if he misses 2 weeks (14 days) that means that we can add 7.78% (14/180) of his salary to the cap ceiling ($447,222), but only if we go over the limit.

As to be expected, a whole lotta nothin’ from the interviews. It is still nice to see the boys out in full form and ready for another season.
A few subtleties:
– Nice TaylorMade Habs cap on Ryan White… where do I get one?
– Gionta could have shaved knowing he’d be greeted with a media scrum at the course.
– I think Jacques Martin has been practicing his interview shtick all summer.. He’s really good at saying nothing with 1000 words.

FORE!!!

TheHockeyRecord.com
Recalling hockey records daily and taking an in-depth look at what they mean for the game of hockey.

What’s there not to like about Elliotte Friedman’s 30 Thoughts? At this point of the off-season, he’s scrapin’ the bottom of the barrel – his Thomas chat was probably stretched into two bullets at the deadline – and, yet, it’s still interestin’.

Pithy. Informative. Insightful.

When the season is underway, it’s that much more compellin’.

There’s a certain poignancy to Friedman’s Pavol Demitra piece from the 2004 World Cup, with Slovakia trailin’ the Russians after the 2nd period of an elimination game. Demitra’s mad. He heads into the dressin’ room and all one can hear is him and Chara yellin’ and swearin’ at their teammates. The competitive intensity, augmented by national pride, and Demitra wants it bad.

From that point of outright fury to eternal silence last week. It’s difficult to ponder for too long.

Can’t believe some are fallin’ for Markov’s ruse. He’s just savin’ himself for Sochi 2014. Everybody knows that how he rolls.

Last night, I watched almost all of that game 7 matchup against Washington in the 2010 playoffs on NHL Network. At least I think it was NHL Network. Regardless, things are obviously a little parched around here.

Two things: Man, has the team’s personnel materially changed over the course of some 18 months; it’s a cap world, we just live in it. More importantly, if you want to appreciate just how steep a learnin’ curve Poindexter Bentley climbed last season, ya gotta watch the game. Night and day. A coach’s dream.

That or JM ruined the kid by benchin’ him early on last season and I’m failin’ to notice it.

Revenue-sharin’ is gonna be the prevailin’ theme at the upcomin’ CBA negotiations. It’s based on a progressive scale that, in light of projected league revenues, has the players takin’ 57%. That is the magic number: 57. I expect we will all be sick of hearin’ about that number not too far in the future.

The point bein’, once both sides’ lawyers have shouted at each other for long enough, some new number will be settled on. I’m gonna say 52%. (Anythin’ lower and there’s no hockey next season.) The second issue will be an attempt by owners to clamp down post entry-level contracts, the same way entry-level contracts were clamped down.

I don’t want any revenue sharing. I would much prefer we go the way of European football where the teams with most fans have the most money and so win the most trophies (except Newcastle United).

Why? Because I actually don’t watch hockey to be entertained. I watch to see my team win. Don’t care about league competitiveness, don’t care if there’s hockey in the Bible belt, don’t care if half the teams fold, don’t care about the risk of the loonie tanking and us becoming a small market team. I want the cup.

Yes, I’m small minded.

(PS: your daily commentaries are far more entertaining than Elliotte’s. I mean – Patrice Bergeron doesn’t know what his ring will look like but he’s looking forward to it? Which finger will you wear it on Patrice?)

In fairness to Friedman, he’s gotta come up with 30 things to say. If he talks to Bergy, and that’s all he gets, it’s presumably fit to print. He’s easily worth your while durin’ the regular season and playoffs.

And he steers clear of line projections. That’s gold, man.

Problem with the NHL is core theory holds that even a monopoly can fail. The system is far from optimal, but I can live with it.

Edit: To be sure, the revenue-sharin’ I was referencin’ is the players’ piece of league revenues and not that which transpires among clubs.

Nobody wants to golf with Gomer ….apparently he has to drive the cart , and when his partner is looking for his ball Gomer drives away as fast as he can, goes all the way to the green and gives the cart away to a group of walkers playing ahead of them (all of this before his partner even gets to the green). Gomez has been reflecting (not for a day or two) since last years tourney and thinks he now knows why noone wants to golf with him anymore.

I was really against Markov getting that contract. 1 year would have been sufficient, for an injury prone player.
keeping Wisznewski would have been much more plausible.
now without Markov, habs are screwed!

Would you actually want the Wiz at 5.5 mill over the next 6 seasons? If so, can you please tell me why?

Is it because he’s only played 70 games in a season once?
Or is it because he’s only had one (maaaaybe two seasons) where he looks like he could be worth the money?

No wait, I bet its because he led our team in giveaways last year.

Wiz is overrated and your 20/20 hindsight has no bearing considering there’s 3 weeks until the season starts.

Markov’s outlet pass and control on the power play (including the sneaky back-door plays) will make you happy we’re not locked down with Wizniewski when it comes time to negotiate the contract of our new core in 2014-2015.

Markov’s outlet pass only means something if he plays.
and why would you give a 3 year contract to an injury prone player?
even if Markov plays, don’t you think psychologically he’ll be constantly thinking about the next time he gets hit? and it will affect his play, and as a result he’ll play differently and put his body into all kinds of gyrations to prevent a hit and as a result get hit.
I honestly believe he won’tlast. his body is too frail.

I’m not about to speculate about what I THINK is going through Markov’s head because its pointless. I don’t know the actual answer and neither do you.

You give him the 3 year deal because its very likely he was not interested in a one year deal, and the guys making the big money in management know way more about the actual health and mindframe of Markov than you or I.

It seems like a gamble, but that’s part of the sport. You think his body is too frail because of two freak occurrences. I think it was bad luck and I also think that Markov still has valuable hockey left in him. He hasn’t even turned 33 yet.

lol, well gomez will get some optimism when he actually becomes a feared player for the habs, guy is a laughing joke, he always is just joking, laughing, goofing around. just once this guy should play with some passion and fire. people were talking about this guy as captain, hes what top 10 nhl slaery, and in his 2 or 3 seasons, i never once seen him even dominate a period.